When Alex Ferguson used to walk down to the touchline and point to his watch, it was a performative gesture delivered for the benefit of opponents and officials rather than his own players. This was Fergie’s line and it sounded good. It told of the great psychological pull he exerted in football. “That’s why I used to go to my watch. I never looked at my watch, I didn’t know how many minutes. It gets across to the opponents and the referee, which is a little trick,” he said in 2014. It would be tempting to say his own players…

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